Thousands of enthusiastic visitors came to China Town Imlek Festival Batam 2023. The event which celebrated the 2547th Chinese New Year was located at Nagoya Citywalk, Batam City. Apart from lion dance (barongsai) and fireworks performances, visitors can also enjoy the Batam micro, small and medium enterprise (MSMEs) bazaar (21/01/2022).
According to travel.tempo.co, the bazaar serves a variety of foods made by MSMEs in Batam. Ranging from traditional food to modern food. The bazaar was welcomed by visitors who were busy queuing in front of the MSMEs booth.
Seeing this enthusiasm, the Governor of the Riau Islands Ansar Ahmad, took the time to inspect the bazaar in person. He sees the diversity of the bazaar and its visitors as evidence of good tolerance among the people.
“Hopefully we can live side by side, regardless of ethnicity, regardless of religion. We must respect each other,” he said while giving a speech.
Ansar Ahmad also admitted that he was proud that Riau people could mingle together regardless of ethnicity and religion. He is grateful because this community can live side by side in harmony. He hopes there will be no horizontal conflicts among the people in the future.
“We are grateful that Riau Islands is the best province in Sumatra. It is in the top 10 of 38 provinces in Indonesia in terms of the index of religious moderation. There are no class 1 or class 2 citizens, we are all the same, there is no difference,” he added.
